Weekend Cooking is hosted by Beth F, over at ‘Beth Fish Reads’. It is open to anyone who has any kind of food-related post to share: Book (novel, nonfiction) reviews, cookbook reviews, movie reviews, recipes, random thoughts, gadgets, quotations, photographs. If your post is even vaguely foodie, feel free to grab the button and link up anytime over the weekend. You do not have to post on the weekend. Please link to your specific post, not your blog’s home page. When leaving your link, don’t forget to leave a comment for Beth F, we all like to receive comments and share your thoughts.

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I must apologise to all you serious ‘foodie’ and cookery buffs out there, who like to take part in this excellent weekend meme, in the hope of exchanging some great new recipe and menu ideas.

I am afraid that ever since I started participating in the meme, I have taken Beth F. literally at her word and have shared some very random and loosly related ‘foodie’ items with you all, almost exclusively from fiction books.

This week is no exception, but I just couldn’t pass up yet another heaven sent opportunity to highlight an author who was featured in a ‘Mailbox Monday’ post of one of my regular commenters, Mary over at ‘Bookfan’.

The author is Sally Berneathy, an experienced, respected and much published writer, of both mystery and romance novels.

Writing under her own name, Sally has introduced Mary and her followers to the ‘Death By Chocolate’ series. Three books of mystery, humour and chocolate recipes …. Sounds good to me!!

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Death by Chocolate

A Delicious Novel

(Mystery, humor, chocolate recipes)

Lindsay Powell’s only secret is the recipe for her chocolate chip cookies, but she is surrounded by neighbors with deadly secrets. Suddenly Lindsay finds herself battling poisoned chocolate, a dead man who doesn’t seem very dead and a psycho stalker.

Her best friend and co-worker, Paula, dyes her blond hair brown, hides from everybody and insists on always having an emergency exit from any room. Secrets from Paula’s past have come back to put lives in jeopardy.

Determined to help Paula and save her own life, Lindsay enlists the reluctant aid of another neighbor, Fred, an OCD computer nerd. In spite of his mundane existence, Fred possesses tidbits of knowledge about such things as hidden microphones, guns and the inside of maximum security prisons.

Lindsay needs more than a chocolate fix to survive all this chaos.

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Murder, Lies and Chocolate

Book 2 of the Death By Chocolate Series

(Mystery, humor, chocolate recipes)

Rodney Bradford comes into Lindsay’s restaurant, offers to buy her small house for double its value, eats her brownies, and drops dead on the sidewalk in front. Then someone breaks into her house and tries to dig up her basement. Next her almost-ex-husband offers to sign the divorce papers, but only if she’ll give him her small, old house and take his big, new house instead.

Suddenly everybody wants Lindsay’s house. Is there oil under the basement, plans to bring the railroad through, pirate treasure buried in the basement? A second break-in occurs and causes her cat, King Henry, to launch into full attack mode, taking a few chunks out of the intruder.

Lindsay enlists the aid of her enigmatic neighbor, Fred, to help solve the mystery while trying to keep her police detective boyfriend, Trent, from getting in their way with his insistence on all those silly cop rules.

On the positive side, sales skyrocket for the special dessert Lindsay calls Murdered Man’s Brownies. Prisoners, murderers, crazy relatives and strippers are all part of the chaos in this second book of the Death by Chocolate series.

BONUS! Chocolate recipes at the end of the book. Poison optional.

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The Great Chocolate Scam

Book 3 of the Death By Chocolate Series

(Mystery, humor, chocolate recipes)

Rick’s car blows up in his driveway. Lindsay is left with an image of Rick’s green SUV flying around the neighborhood along with pieces of Rick—a blue contact lens in Mrs. Hawkins’ driveway, a perfectly creased trouser leg hanging on the street sign, a vertebra on the immaculate lawn.

Since their divorce wasn’t final and Rick has no family, Lindsay assumes she is his only heir. Then Bryan Kollar, local celebrity bodybuilder and owner of the chain of gyms, Body by Bryan, comes into Death by Chocolate and asks to buy back the flour mill built by his great-grandfather and purchased by Rick before his death. Lindsay readily agrees that, as soon as she gets title, she’ll return it to him.

But before his estate is settled, Rick has more relatives than a lottery winner.

What was Rick planning to do with the old flour mill? Why does Bryan want it back? He doesn’t even eat refined flour!

Is the obnoxious Rickie, Jr., really Rick’s son? Why is the woman who claims to be Rick’s mother so certain the child is not her grandson? Are these people really related to Rick, or was he actually an alien stranded on earth when the mother ship left without him?

Come for the Cookie Dough Cheesecake Bars, stay for the murder, mayhem and fun!

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A tasty little trio, I’m sure you’ll agree?

Don’t you just love those covers … All that chocolate … What a great way to go!!!

First Lines

Prologue My brother and I were kidnapped off a street in Chungking, China, when I was five years old. Our amah, Mi Ling, was shoved into shelves at an open-air stall called the Prosperity Medicine Shop. Blue and white jars filled with herbs clattered to the cobblestones. A rough hand seized my neck. I was […]

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